


When I Have Fears

by lastdream



Category: Marvel 616
Genre: Artificial Intelligence, M/M, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Pining, Tony Feels, canonical not exactly character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-29
Updated: 2017-06-29
Packaged: 2018-11-20 22:45:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11344647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lastdream/pseuds/lastdream
Summary: Tony Stark has made a lot of intelligent programming in his time, but none of that experience is quite like making an AI version ofhimself.





	When I Have Fears

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thanks to [Caz](cazdinal.tumblr.com) for inspiration, encouragement, and the lovely art found in this story (also [here](http://cazdraws.tumblr.com/post/162524582896/and-steve-himself-the-very-top-of-the-priority) on tumblr). Even more thanks to [Muccamukk](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Muccamukk) for the beta, which cleaned up a lot of phrasing weirdness.
> 
> Technically, this draws from current comic canon, but you shouldn't need to know too many specifics to understand it. Also: I adore Keats <3

Tony Stark has made a lot of intelligent programming in his time. There are the basic versions, only there to help him work through calculations, and the more complex creations that help him run his armors. There are the digital imitations of his friends—like PEPPER, and QUILL. He knows his way around AI technology by now, backwards and forwards, inside and out.

None of that experience is quite like making an AI version of _himself_.

It’s not that it’s difficult, exactly. The good, important parts of Tony are already taken care of. A computer can’t help but be quick-thinking, and there are more than enough records of Tony’s thought patterns and strategies floating around. The data needed to operate the armor has been compiled for years now, ready in case of his death. Avalon. This is just… consolidation, really. Putting all of those things into a single, self-contained AI unit.

So it’s not that it’s difficult.

The problem is that he can’t just leave it at that. Iron Man is easy to digitize: armor, intelligence, priority sequences, done.

Tony Stark is so much worse.

 

*

 

Tony’s a coward, so he starts with the easy things. The things he likes. Sarcasm. Snark. The ability to reference obscure science fiction in the middle of a battle. Some teaching routines, in case Kamala or Sam or Miles want homework help again. Riri probably won’t, but he programs routines for her, too. He gives them some literary analysis and language programming besides, because there’s no reason he can’t improve on the original a little.

But that’s not the end of it. The AI has to _want_ to help them. It has to _care_ about them, the same way Tony cares about his—

They’re not his.

The same way he cares about _the_ kids.

He programs them into the top of the priority sequences, which isn’t hard. He leaves notes in the code that say things like _Kamala requires encouragement routines_ and _Miles requires diversion routines_ , so that the AI will know how to help and guide them when they need it. That’s more difficult, but so much more important. That’s what this is _for_. Keeping them alive is not enough.

There is no way to make an artificial intelligence _feel_ love for them, but Tony can at least make his construct imitate the behaviors of it. In the end, what does it matter except that _they_ think it’s real? It’s good enough. He thinks it’s good enough. If he dies, it’ll have to be.

 

*

 

If he dies, they’ll need somewhere to keep what’s left of him. Somewhere safe. It’s not even ego or vanity; his body and brain are unique, and even dead there’s so much that a structure like his could be used for. So much evil that could be done with it, in the wrong hands.

So he builds a failsafe for his body, as well as his mind. A pod, armored and sealed, that will keep his remains safe. Keep them in stasis.

If his body is transferred to the pod quickly enough, it might even be preserved, held back from death, but Tony doesn’t hope for that too hard. He’s seen the way things have been going, lately.

 

*

 

After that, Tony keeps going. He has a lot of behaviors that the AI will have to imitate, if it’s going to be a true representation of him.

Not all of his behaviors are good.

He’s tempted, so tempted, to keep improving on himself, to make this creation the perfect child he could never be. To make up for every flaw and failing he’s tried so hard to beat out of his own character. The artificial intelligence could be _better_. A pure, untarnished legacy to leave behind.

He wants that so much.

But everyone already knows what he’s like. They know him; they’ve seen how very far he can fall. How human he is. He won’t lie to them.

So Tony teaches his AI to deflect, to evade, except when the information is more important than the damaged heart this AI won’t even really have. He teaches it not to burden anyone with problems they don’t need to deal with. He teaches it to take care of difficulties before they trouble other people. He teaches it to put on a brave face.

It will be better at all these things than he is, Tony thinks. This Stark really will be made of iron.

 

*

 

Except, of course, when it won’t. There are limits to how much anything can take.

Tony takes a deep breath, and he teaches his AI what it’s like to be drunk.

It’s been a long, long time since he allowed himself to linger, to daydream, to immerse himself in the fantasy of that sensation, and it’s almost overwhelming. He wants it so badly. His mouth waters. His fingers shake while he types, tells his AI exactly why it must never accept that perfect forgetfulness. How it will hurt the top of the priority sequence the most. The AI will know exactly how good, and how awful, every moment of this feels.

Tony will turn it on, press _enter_ , and this child will be born an alcoholic.

God, Tony hates himself.

He programs that in, too, just for good measure, and then he thinks very seriously about giving up. No one deserves to come into the world feeling like this, even if it _is_ a version of Tony Stark. _This_ version, this all-too-human version, is the one who earned that.

But he can’t quit, not when there are people who need him. Not Steve, never Steve—Steve had needed _someone_ , when he was low, when he was in a pinch, and so many times Tony had been privileged enough to be the _someone_ who was there at the time. Steve didn’t need _him_ , not really.

But the kids. The Avengers. People.

Tony can’t stop now.

 

*

 

Things get worse, and Tony adds more and more safeguards to the pod.

No one will be able to open it. No one will be able to activate any of the advanced functions, the ones that will affect the state of Tony’s body. No one will be able to get at him, to help him or to harm him. Not even his friends.

No one, except Steve. It’s too much. It’s foolish, and romantic, and far, far too much to ask.

But Tony can’t quite give up stupid hope that if he dies, maybe then, maybe just for a moment, Steve will be moved enough to say the words Tony always dreamed of. Enough to say goodbye, the way Tony knows he himself must once have said goodbye. Maybe even enough to reach for his cold skin, just a brush, one last touch of gentleness.

And it’s too much, it is, but Tony sets the unlock codes all the same. If he wakes, he’ll never say a word, but he’ll know that for a moment, at least, it was true.

If he doesn’t, well, he’ll never have to live with it.

 

*

 

He goes down the list. Friends, and threats. The AI will learn most of this from the Avengers’ database, but there are things that never go into reports. How he trusts Carol to the bone, and how they share the awful thirst at the core of themselves. How he works with Namor, but never trusts him more than he has to. How he finds an odd camaraderie with James Barnes, sharing a best friend for such a long time.

And Steve himself. The very top of the priority sequence.

God, there’s so much to say about Steve. It would take a lifetime to put it all down in code. Even with uploads of all Tony’s memories, he knows the AI still won’t understand. How could it?

How could it understand loving a man and still being so angry with him you can barely speak? How could it understand falling in love side by side on a battlefield and crying in an empty bed and smiling so damn wide when he touches the shoulder of your armor and calls you _friend_? Wanting to reach out and touch as badly as breathing, knowing you never, ever can?

That last, a hologram might come to understand. Tony puts his head in his hands, and he knows how cruel he is.

He has to leave some kind of instruction, some kind of note in the code, to help his creation make sense of the mess it’ll find in Tony’s head. He can’t say _you love him_ ; that much will be obvious from the first memories it encounters. He can’t say _follow him,_ either. It’s too broad, too dangerous. He knows too well that Steve can be wrong.

Steve was wrong in the Civil War, when he gave up on working with Tony to take Registration down from the inside, and he was wrong about the Guardsmen and the Supreme Intelligence and so many other things. He was wrong about the end of the world, too, though no one remembers that anymore.

That was when Tony had given up on working with Steve. When he had wiped Steve’s mind rather than continue an argument that went nowhere.

It’s the worst thing he can remember doing.

For a long minute, Tony considers just deleting it all. Not the mistakes, of course—that would be too much like pretending they’d never happened—but the useless longing that has filled up his thoughts, his heart, for a decade or more. He’d never been able to let go, no matter how straight or how furious Steve seemed, but there’s no reason to doom the artificial version to the same fate. With everything else that’s going on, no one will even notice if an AI Tony Stark stops pining for a man who will be even less interested in his digital self.

But in the end, Tony never changes. He couldn’t let go before, and he can’t let go now. Much as it hurts, loving Steve has always felt like a _good thing_ , like hope, and he can’t bring himself to take that away.

He swallows a lump in his throat, and the memories stay.

_Believe in Steve Rogers_ , Tony writes, and he prays the AI will understand.

*

 

It’s too much, what Tony’s asking for, and he knows it.

The pod is finished, ready to lock away his body and keep it safe, keep the rest of the world safe. It will close, and it will seal, and it will never release his remains unless he’s healed enough to wake, or unless—

They’ll probably just bury him in the pod.

 

*

 

Tony Stark all but dies, and he goes into stasis.

A long way away, the artificial intelligence wakes up.

The Iron Man routines come online first. Armor controls, decision-making algorithms, strategies, priority sequences. They organize themselves in neat lines of code, full of determination and strength and self-sacrifice. The intelligence wakes up, and he looks at himself. The first act of a newly sentient mind.

He looks at himself, and he sees what he can become. He sees what he was meant to be. He does not know how to feel, but looking at the Iron Man in himself, he thinks he wants to learn.

This is what it means to be a hero, he thinks. This is what it means to be  _good_.

But then, as he watches, more and more routines appear, linked and tangled in with the Iron Man files. They are messy code, patched and disjointed and rough, strewn with notes and links to memory files. They contradict each other, and they are so often destructive. He does not know how to feel, but looking at the rest of himself, he thinks that he does not want to learn.

Iron Man is straightforward: armor, intelligence, goodness,  _heroism_. Iron Man is the very best of what he is.

Tony Stark is so much worse.

 

**Author's Note:**

> In case any of you aren't crying as much as I am (or know as little about coding as I do, haha), the bit of code that Caz wrote for the art literally means that for as long as AI Tony exists, he will believe in Steve Rogers. It's the background of his existence. _He can't not believe in him_. I'm dead.


End file.
